A Liberal senator wants to know what Leigh Sales earns. Me too

I am utterly delighted Liberal senator Sarah Henderson wants to know more about who earns what at the ABC. I am so with her.

Henderson, now opposition communication spokeswoman, is demanding names, rank and serial numbers of anyone earning more than $230,000. The senator, base salary $217,000 plus loadings, started her love affair with journalism back in the ’90s, winning a Walkley for best coverage of a current story (television) for the ABC. Her enduring support of our public broadcaster hasn’t always been so apparent – as part of the Coalition government, during the culture wars, she backed the slashing of half a billion from the ABC.

Sarah Ferguson, David Speers and Leigh Sales.

But on this matter, Henderson has a point. There are some startling pay issues at the ABC that Henderson could investigate for real change. While she’s obsessing about Leigh Sales, David Speers and Sarah Ferguson, may I direct her attention to what’s happening to women employed at the ABC? The ABC’s gender pay audit says there’s a 5 per cent gap between men and women because there is a “higher representation of women than men in the lower-paid bands”.

In August this year, a bunch of women in the NSW newsroom, led by TV newsreader Juanita Phillips, sought an urgent meeting with the new head of news, Justin Stevens. Like Henderson, they too want pay transparency at the national broadcaster. Phillips put forward two brave motions. One, that ABC News has issues with gender equality that warrant further investigation; and two, that there should be a “confidential staff survey on workplace culture within ABC News” conducted externally. Both passed unanimously.

Newsreader Juanita Phillips, who led the protest over inequality. Credit: ABC

The list of concerns is long and familiar to all working women: blokes given higher-profile, better-paid jobs, with more opportunities; women treated poorly after parental leave; resistance to job sharing and other workplace flexibility; women relegated to writing weather reports or story-producing for other – male – reporters.

Soon after that first meeting, more meetings popped up across the nation. Older women felt forced out (there’s a list), while male colleagues got promoted. Stevens wrote a supportive letter on August 23 to all staff, saying he would get back to women at the ABC. He conceded staff were entitled to a “respectful, fulfilling, supportive and enjoyable workplace”.

Leigh Sales is among the high-profile journalists whose salary could be made public.Credit: Nic Walker

Goodo. For months, the women waited. Now, in a couple of hot minutes, an email to all staff was sent on Tuesday announcing a meeting on Wednesday to form a gender equity and inclusion employee network, flagged by chief executive David Anderson earlier this year. (There are not only hurdles for women but for First Nations people, for those with a disability, for those from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.)

Earlier this year, Stevens acknowledged racism and bigotry within the ABC. But on Wednesday, an email from Stevens to staff said more would be done to ensure the ABC was a better place to work for everyone, such as a truckload of training programs and action plans (yeah, yeah, but a start) and, as that first meeting requested, external advice. Stevens also acknowledged Phillips. It takes guts to lead a revolt (and sweet Phillips, on a hefty package herself, did hard yards).

It especially takes guts to stand up to bosses who are themselves under pressure, brought about by Henderson and Coalition colleagues. Challenging bosses to change the way they do things makes us all a little fearful, especially women. Especially women with children who feel their working lives are precarious anyway. While it’s important to acknowledge there were men at the ABC who put together diversity plans, it is also important to understand plans are not actions.

It’s also an opportunity for voters to make clear to the government the ABC needs protected funding. The Minister for Communications, Michelle Rowland, noted the impact of the Coalition’s cuts in a speech to the Victorian branch of ABC Friends last month. The government has restored $83.7 million and Rowland promised the establishment of five-year funding terms for both the ABC and SBS and a review of the mayhem left behind.

Good on us, the voters, for keeping the pressure on. Funding is partly fixed. Likewise reliability, though it’s not enough. The culture of an organisation embattled for years reverts to old, bad habits. The ABC will have to step up on pay transparency – and on role transparency. A granular gender pay audit, like for like. Real equality across the board.

I’d be fighting alongside Henderson at the barricades. To be honest, I don’t much care what Sales, Speers or Sarah Ferguson earn. They earn the big bucks for being on the front lines. But I do care that working women get the same breaks as working men. Maybe Senator Henderson could throw her weight behind that campaign.

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